Winfluence with Jason Falls

If you’re an influencer or a talent manager, today’s commentary might make you a little uncomfortable. I’m just going to throw that out there as a warning. But bear with me … I’m going to dish some harsh realities to our brand and agency side friends, too.  

We’ve been talking a lot lately about when to pay influencers. Last week’s commentary answered a listener question about when to transition from paying with only product, to adding cash to the mix. 

But we haven’t really dug into WHY we pay influencers. And depending on your perspective, the answer to that question is different. 

Influencers think we pay them for their talent. Brands think we pay them for their audiences. Talent managers think we pay them for a magical list of exhaustive qualities few of us pay attention to. And agencies think we pay influencers because they’ve duped the world into thinking they’re effective. 

Sarcasm aside, the first thought of why we pay influencers has long been, to get our message in front of their audience. But that WHY is all wrong. 

The problem is there are multiple WHYs in the equation. And those WHYs need to be considered by influencers and talent managers in how they price brand engagements. They also need to be understood by brands and agencies so what they pay is fair.

But what is fair pay for influencer and content creator engagement? We’ll look at the various WHYs and I’ll share what I think is a direction towards fair, in today’s commentary.

This episode is sponsored by Tagger, the complete influencer marketing solution. It has recently released a new product feature called Signals, which provides creator listening for its customers. Tagger president and founder Pete Kennedy joins Jason Falls to explain more about Signals.

To see it for yourself and get a demo of Tagger, visit jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

I have been a student of stand-up comedy from my earliest memories. I would stay up late when I was little to watch The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson just to see the monologue, then hope beyond all hope one of the acts that night was a comedian. Later, I fell in love with David Letterman, who had more comedians and introduced me to a broader love of the craft.

I bought cassette tapes of Dennis Miller, Bobcat Goldthwait and more. And, of course, anyone who grew up in the 1980s and loved stand-up comedy, had Eddie Murphy’s Delirious and Raw memorized. 

I love stand-up. And stand-up comedians. So I was quite aware of the plight of them during the pandemic. Clubs couldn’t open safely. Many closed for good. And the comedians themselves? They had to turn to alternative ways to earn a living. 

One of those comedians used the challenge of the pandemic to turn his colleagues from the club circuit into content creators for brands. Richie Redding spent 19 years as a club comedian. The last 13 of those that was his full-time job. When he reached the point of pandemic panic, not knowing how he was going to pay the bills, he got a call from an ad agency that needed a funny video. 

The ask to be a content creator lit a fire under him and Redding started a comedy consulting firm. Funnier Than You Are offers brands the opportunity to tap into professional comedians for comedy content. Redding forms a writer’s room and matches the writer friends with the brand’s target audience. The content they’re producing is making a dent, helping brands churn out far better content than they would otherwise, even from their agencies … and I’m an agency guy!

But beyond that, Redding is expanding the concept to help build individual influence and influencer status for his roster of comedy writer’s too. 

This episode is sponsored by Tagger, the complete influencer marketing solution. It has recently released a new product feature called Signals, which provides creator listening for its customers. Tagger president and founder Pete Kennedy joins Jason Falls to explain more about Signals.

To see it for yourself and get a demo of Tagger, visit jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

A couple of weeks ago a marketing executive with an online retailer in the United Kingdom reached out to ask for my feedback on something. Her situation was not dissimilar to many people who email or message me with influencer marketing inquiries. 

The company sells sporting goods and apparel, has grown nicely over the last few years and is trying to find ways to drive more revenue and growth through social media. Like most of us, they’re turning to influencers as one channel to improve that part of their marketing mix. 

But, again like many, they haven’t been overly impressed with the return on their investment in influencers. According to her inquiry, “many of our influencer campaigns perform poorly, or not quite as expected.”

To date, the company has only engaged influencers willing to exchange posts for products. They haven’t had to outlay cash. In their defense, for those of you who think there should always be a cash offering to creators, some of the products they have had to offer score in the thousands of dollars, so it’s not out of the question to think a trade for services might be in order on occasion.

That gray area between exchanging posts for product and investing in influencers on a more advanced, but also cash-centric level is a difficult one to navigate without upsetting some apple carts along the way, either internal or external. So the executive in question posed this as a question:

“We’re finding it difficult to differentiate the accounts likely to succeed vs those that generate nothing. Generally, our outreach attempts do get responses, though more and more are requiring cash instead of product. Do you think it’s necessary to provide cash now as an incentive to better our chances at achieving our goals?”

She said they would appreciate any ideas I had on how they should better approach influencers and how they should look at compensating them.

I’ll share my answer in today’s commentary.

This episode is sponsored by Tagger, the complete influencer marketing solution. It has recently released a new product feature called Signals, which provides creator listening for its customers. Tagger president and founder Pete Kennedy joins Jason Falls to explain more about Signals.

To see it for yourself and get a demo of Tagger, visit jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We talked last time about the influencer pay gap and new data from IZEA that gives us a look at progress made … or not … in the breakdown of how women are paid compared to men and how various races and groups are paid when compared to white counterparts. 

One of the surprising pieces of data there for me was the vast gap in the number of influencers by gender. IZEA’s numbers showed that 83 percent of the content creators it analyzed were women. Whether or not that gives us some level of explanation or context around the gender pay gap, that’s a huge difference in sheer numbers.

Collabstr also recently released some interesting influencer industry data. Collabstr is also a software company that helps brands source influencers and content creators on various social networks. Its 2022 State of Influencer Marketing Report has another treasure trove of data analyzing the 5,000 brands and 27,000 influencers in Collabstr’s data set.

It goes deeper in the gender and age breakdowns of influencers by platform. Did you know that over 80 percent of TikTok creators from 50,000 followers and down are women? Seventy-five percent of TikTokers making money with Collabstr are females. The number on Instagram is 78 percent. YouTube is even woman-heavy at 69% of creators from the female side of the gender aisle.

Kyle Dulay is a co-founder at Collabstr. He joined med recently to talk through his company’s report, its implications for brands and, of course, we spent a little time talking about Collabstr’s platform and what makes it stand out. 

Today's episode is sponsored by Tagger, a complete influencer marketing management solution. We talk to Tagger customers to get their insights on the platform and influence marketing. TJ Ferrara is one of those customers. He’s the co-founder of Bubs Naturals, a health and wellness family of products. I spoke to him recently about how he uses Tagger. 

To learn more and get a demo to see if Tagger is right for you, just visit jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You can’t be involved in the influencer marketing space without hearing about, talking about or considering the influencer pay gap. When the topic first emerged, it referred to the disparity in pay between men and women who are content creators. Quickly, however, the influencer pay gap issue focused on the gap between white and non-white or BIPOC creators as well.

For a while in early 2021, it was almost all we talked about. Mind you, I’m not complaining. We were right to talk about it. And talk about it a lot. The more equitable and fair pricing and payment can be across influencer categories, the better. 

And it appears our conversations are having a positive impact on the gap. It is shrinking.

New data out from IZEA, which has been tracking pay disparity among influencers since 2015, shows another year of progress in closing the gaps. 

But when you look further at the data, more questions than answers emerge. It’s not time to celebrate yet. It is time to start asking deeper questions about the data so we’re not looking at false positives and missing hidden problems.

I’ll dig into it, and explain, in today’s commentary.

Today's episode is sponsored by Tagger, a complete influencer marketing management solution. We talk to Tagger customers to get their insights on the platform and influence marketing. TJ Ferrara is one of those customers. He’s the co-founder of Bubs Naturals, a health and wellness family of products. I spoke to him recently about how he uses Tagger. 

To learn more and get a demo to see if Tagger is right for you, just visit jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Despite my best efforts, the world of social media continues to migrate to … some might say devolve to … short form content as the most desirable type. Forgive my contrarianism about TikToks, Reels and Stories, but I’m a podcaster and a blogger. I’m also a B2B content creator myself, which tends to lean toward longer-form content as the preference. 

So my nature is simply the antithesis of 15-second videos and 10-second story frames. When I stop to consume content … and apparently create it … I want to read an article. Or watch an in-depth video interview or documentary. Or listen to a podcast, which depending on the topic, could last 15 minutes like my Monday commentaries. 30-minutes or so like these interview episodes, or even a lot longer if the subject of the interview or the topic of conversation is really interesting. 

But, I’m creeping up on 50. The trendy audiences most marketers covet are half my age. And alas, have less than half my attention span. 

All joking aside, all of us marketers, regardless of age or content preference, have to recognize, understand and implement strategies and tactics that feature short-form content.

Ashwath Narayanan is the CEO and founder of Social Currant. It is a, “next generation youth-powered emerging media agency,” according to its website at SocialCurrant.co. It also has a companion influencer marketing search engine to help you identify content creators.

But Social Currant specializes in that hot, trendy short-form content. So, I asked Narayanan to swing by and chat with us about why it is so imperative for marketers to embrace it, how to create good short-form content and his take on influence marketing in general.

I turned a nice phrase in this episode that bakes in a nice reminder of how to mix short form content with long-form, so keep an ear out for that. I’m hoping it catches on.  

This episode is sponsored by Tagger. It is a complete influencer marketing solution. You can find out more for yourself at jason.online/tagger. 

In this episode, we visit with T.J. Ferrara from Bubs Naturals, a health supplement company, about how they use Tagger. 

To start building your own experiences with my influencer marketing software of choice, go to jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Whether you’re an influencer or a brand, the concept of the creator marketplace brings with it some appeal. For the content creators out there, the opportunities to work directly with brands can be a lifeline. That’s especially true when you’re growing your audience from micro- to mid-tier or mid-tier to mega influencer.

For brands, creator marketplaces mean simple integrations to support creator content with amplification through paid spend, and easily integrated analytics … no chasing screen shots or performance numbers from creators after the fact. 

But the transparency in pricing in creator marketplaces also drives costs down over time. I know when I look through creator marketplaces for clients, I often look for 2-3 lower-cost creators that equal the impact of one with a larger following and larger fee. Eventually those larger fee influencers catch on and lower their rates to stay competitive. 

So creator marketplaces are a boon for brands that often struggle with paying one influencer as much as it can cost to hire an entire agency to create an ad campaign. And over time, creator marketplaces mean the cost to the brand becomes more efficient. 

While there seems to be good and bad for both creators and brands in the creator marketplace model, there are a few of us who know in the long-run, creator marketplaces will kill creators.

I’ll explain how and why I know, in today’s commentary.

Today’s episode is presented by Tagger. It is a complete influencer marketing solution. You can find out more for yourself at jason.online/tagger. 

In this episode, we visit with Meredith Jacobson from We Are Boosters, about how she uses Tagger. 

To start building your own experiences with my influencer marketing software of choice, go to jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

For those of you who have been with me on this journey through influence marketing for a while, you know that I get really excited when we can zero in on the concept of influence rather than influencers. The whole theme of my book Winfluence, and a lot of what we talk about here on Winfluence, the podcast, focuses on the fact that removing the "R" from the term means we have a more holistic approach and success with leveraging third parties to influence audiences to take action.

In the world of sales and marketing, the term Influence gets thrown around, but it often harkens people back to the seminal book on persuasion from Dr. Robert Cialdini called Influence. It was published in 1984 and is still selling today. In fact, the most recent update actually amended his six principles of persuasion. There are now seven which my guest and I get into today on the show.

That guest is Brian Ahearn. He is a Cialdini disciple. So much so that he’s even been certified as a Cialdini instructor and teaches techniques in influence and persuasion to corporate sales teams, marketing departments and beyond for a living. I chatted with Brian on Digging Deeper, Cornett’s podcast a few months back. He told me then he was working on a new book. 

That new book is out. It’s called The Influencer. And he’s here today to talk about it, but also to walk us through the principles of influence he teaches and how they can apply to our own credibility and influence, but also in practical manifestations like choosing the right influencers to use for your influence marketing efforts. 

The book, by the way, is a story of fiction … a business allegory if you will … about a character named John Andrews, and his path to learning to become influential. I loved the book. It reminded me of a similar parable approach to business principles which is probably my favorite business book ever called Happy Work, by my pal Chris Reimer. 

Brian will tell you more about it and influence in today’s episode, which is presented by Tagger. It is a complete influencer marketing solution. You can find out more for yourself at jason.online/tagger. 

In this episode, we visit with Meredith Jacobson from We Are Boosters, about how she uses Tagger. 

To start building your own experiences with my influencer marketing software of choice, go to jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

My pal Seth Goldstein asked an interesting question on Twitter last week. He posed this:

“Is podcasting just a form of busking?”

For those who don’t know, busking is a term used mostly in Britain to describe street musicians and performers. The root of the definition is people who perform publicly for tips. Seth is not only a friend, but one of my fellow Marketing Podcast Network hosts and creators, so I chimed in.

My response was quick, but I think accurate and definitive: I said, “Certainly not. Podcast listening is opt-in and on-demand. Busking would be pushing your podcast through a loudspeaker system and blasting it to people who didn’t ask for it.”

Tanner Campbell disagreed on Twitter. And then devoted an entire episode of his show Podcasting Sucks, to arguing against my position. He called me out and picked apart my answer in a good, old fashioned, social media throw down.

Perhaps Tanner doesn’t realize that the first time I came to anyone’s attention on the Internet, I posted a scathing review of a social media conference by calling out the speakers there I thought did the attendees an injustice. The dais included Rand Fishkin, Danny Sullivan, Neil Patel and many others considered luminaries then and now.

And I stood my ground. Which is, incidentally, why I started getting invited to speak at conferences rather than attend them.

That’s right Tanner! I was kicking up stuff on the social medias before you had facial hair. You poked the bear, son. 

I respond to Tanner’s rebuke in today’s commentary, which for the record, will be presented in a satirical caricature for fun. This is, after all, as Tanner put it, a silly topic. So I’ll be silly with it. Enjoy!

This episode of Winfluence is presented by Tagger. It is a complete influencer marketing solution. You can find out more for yourself at jason.online/tagger. 

In this episode, we visit with Meredith Jacobson from We Are Boosters, about how she uses Tagger. 

To start building your own experiences with my influencer marketing software of choice, go to jason.online/tagger today.

More Links:

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In influencer marketing, and certainly in marketing overall, there are generally two types of focus. The one we talk about more often is consumer marketing, also know as business-to-consumer or B2C. Then there’s business-to-business, or B2B.

B2B brands sell software, equipment or services to businesses, sometimes for price tags far too high for an individual purchase. So think of complex IT systems, office equipment, construction machinery or even professional services like legal, accounting, human resources or even marketing agencies. B2B sales cycles are longer … sometimes in excess of 12- to 18-months. So there’s a lot more for a brand to do to attract prospects, build relationships and trust, educate the prospect about the product and ultimately get them to commit sometimes significant corporate dollars to pay for it. 

That relationship building and trust is key. And for many B2B brands, that’s where influencers come in. But not Instagrammers and TikTok-ers, per say. B2B influencers are those that have deep knowledge and trust in very specific communities. They’re often academics, industry analysts, executives, researchers and more. Often, their influence can’t be measured by their number of online followers. As such, B2B influencer marketing is often more difficult. 

Justin Levy is the director of social media and influencer marketing for Demandbase. It is a company that provides software to manage the account-based experience. So think of CRM software that also ties your content marketing into the sales process. It keeps your database of prospective customers, a record of all the times and ways you’ve communicated with them, where they are in the sales process, and what content you should serve them next to move them along to purchase.

Justin spent several years at Citrix managing the GoToMeeting and GoToWebinar social and influencer connections, so he has a lot of experience building B2B influencer relations.

We caught up with Justin to talk about how he finds influencers for his B2B efforts, what kind of engagements he and the Demandbase team engage them for, and then how his company uses content in an innovative approach to meet the prospect and other stakeholders where they are in the process. 

He gives us good insight into how a B2B brand works and thinks of influencers. I’m sure the conversation will inform and inspire you, even if your focus is more B2C.

This episode of Winfluence is presented by Tagger. It is a complete influencer marketing solution. You can find out more for yourself at jason.online/tagger. 

In this episode, we visit with Alexandra Walsh from 3 Day Blinds, a premium window treatment brand, about how she uses Tagger. 

To start building your own experiences with my influencer marketing software of choice, go to jason.online/tagger today.

Hosted by Jason Falls, Winfluence is a production of Falls+Partners. Explore the ideas and get help putting them into practice at fallspartners.com. Winfluence is a proud member of MPN – The Marketing Podcast Network.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.